It was a terrible cloud at twilight

Kristina Marie Darling

In her second book of poems, It was a terrible cloud at twilight, Alessandra Lynch offers readers a complex understanding of childhood, in which misfortune and loss often prompt a premature transition to adulthood. Filled with barren landscapes and abandoned playgrounds, the works in this collection frequently reframe narratives like fairy tales from a mature perspective, suggesting that even the most innocent phases in one’s life can become riddled with tragedy. Eloquently conveyed through her pairing of the philosophical with the everyday, Lynch’s poetry raises fascinating questions about the place of grief in everyday life, “brooding” and “glittering” all the while.

Throughout the book, Lynch continually revisits the transition from youth to adulthood, in which she depicts a burgeoning consciousness of the possibility of loss. Frequently conveying this theme through imagery of the natural world, Lynch gracefully mirrors her speakers’ internal conflicts and realizations in descriptions of the landscapes that surround them. By situating disenchanted narrators in desolate fields and dim houses, the poems in this collection create fascinating tensions between interior and exterior, a theme that recurs as the book unfolds. These ideas are exemplified by a poem in the collection entitled “Nostalgia,” in which an adult speaker’s idealized vision of youth is conveyed through descriptions of her surroundings. Lynch writes, for example, in this poem,

The dark kicks up its shimmer. Remember

when catch & fish was a sentence,

glimmer took precedence over lake

& burnish defied the dull skull, surpassing sheer bone? (23)

In this passage, the adult speaker expresses nostalgia for a more innocent time in her life, and, in doing so, renders the landscape she inhabited in a similarly wistful fashion. While recalling a time when “burnish defied/the dull/skull, surpassing sheer bone,” and tragedy remained a distant prospect, her surroundings take on a similarly picturesque quality. Particularly apparent in phrases like “glimmer took precedence/over lake” and “dark kicks up/its shimmer,” Lynch depicts both the scenery and the character’s psyche as being yet untouched by life, a quality that her speaker tries and fails to recapture. “Nostalgia,” like many other poems in the collection, depicts maturation from childhood to adulthood in an uncompromising and lyric manner, which often lends it itself to multiple readings.

Along these lines, Lynch renders children’s stories and fairy tales in a similar way, often reframing such narratives to mirror the changes in her speaker’s worldview, particularly those that have taken place since early youth. In doing so, the poems in It was a terrible cloud at twilight reveal such childhood memories as being riddled with incipient sorrow and looming tragedies. Particularly apparent in a piece entitled “Hanged Doll,” Lynch frequently suggests that although surrounded by dark omens, one often fails to recognize them, especially in the innocent mindset of early life. She writes, for example, in the piece

…Memory working this way—a sun-masked cloud, a night bird, then the sky rising through black dawn in mist. You yourself hung over the white bed where you could glimpse her human hair, the yellow stitch of mouth propped in smile, the brown eyes jammed open, perpetually almost pleading… (15)

As in other poems within the collection, the piece invokes landscape as a means by which to convey its speaker’s more mature worldview, in which she looks back on childhood as a state of blissful oblivion to the misfortunes inherent in adult life. Particularly apparent in her description of the children playing amidst the imposing “black dawn in mist” and an ominous “sun-masked cloud,” Lynch creates tension between the children’s idealistic outlook and the threatening environment that surrounds them. By doing so, “Hanged Doll” presents a dark and particularly complex picture of childhood, in which grief looms like a “night bird” above one’s idyllic present-day life.

In conveying these themes, the poems in It was a terrible cloud at twilight often retain a redemptive quality, in which such tragedy within and around the narrator gives way to self-knowledge and discovery. As with other themes in the collection, Lynch often conveys these realizations by projecting them onto the speaker’s surroundings, gracefully merging interior and exterior. Especially noteworthy in such poems as “Envoy,” the final work in the collection, Lynch gracefully uses everyday imagery to convey profound moments in its speaker’s inner lives. She writes, for example, in this piece,

…You were predisposed to silence then

and climbed its sheer side and walked through the gravel, through the glass door where the dark room waited and all the errors in your life finally curled around you, at your feet, their bristles flat, their eyes gold with forgiveness. (71)

By including such passages in this collection, Alessandra Lynch suggests that although a loss of innocence is often inherent in gaining maturity and wisdom, these qualities often give way to a greater understanding of one’s self and surroundings. In “Envoy,” the poet conveys this change in worldview through the “eyes gold with forgiveness” in the otherwise dark room, suggesting that even in this tragic landscape, redemption remains a ever present possibility. As in many other works in Lynch’s debut, this work presents a multifaceted vision of loss, youth, and maturity, proving “shimmering” and “sublime” throughout.

All points considered, Alessandra Lynch’s It was a terrible cloud at twilight is a finely crafted and meditative read. Highly recommended.

Kristina Marie Darling is a graduate of Washington University in St. Louis, where she is currently pursuing a master's degree. Recent awards include residencies from the Centrum Foundation and the Mary Anderson Center for the Arts.